Sunday, September 23, 2007

So Its Darjeeling over Shillong!

Prashant Tamang pipped Amit Paul to the post last night to be the next Indaian Idol. Well I am happy in some respects and sad in others. Lets have it happy side up-
1 When my friend Fenela, her mother and aunt went about Delhi in their Khasi dress they were asked which country they had come from. My friend whose feature are slightly on the lines of the people of the north east has been asked "tto, aap kya Nepal side ki hein?" I am sure many people have come across many such examples where people of the north east are taken as belonging to some place across the eastern border of India, in this scenario to have a very north eastern guy as the new idol of the nation was a pleasant surprise.
2 This guy really made it good. He comes from a lower middle class family and this windfall will really be of great use.
3 These shows have given a lot of ordinary folks who have some talent a very very wide platform.
4 We TV watchers have got a respite from saas bahu serials and can watch our children sing and dance to entertain us.
The down side
1 This is a show about music and the best guy should win. This chap Amit was the better singer, he had improved a lot since he first arrived here and Prashant has remained the same, just a good casual singer.
2 The Indian prejudices have come to the fore in the sms voting system- 'no girls please, we are Indian', Dipali and Puja were good, I would have liked to see a Dipali vs Amit final. There was another Amit whom I felt for Amit Sana of the first Indian idol fame, he sang much better than the winner and was the better performer, he was a few shades darker than Abhijit..so skin colour maatters in India.
3Vote appeals to particular states or linguisting peoples really irks me. There were posters of Prashant in Kolkata saying 'Please Make Prashant Win' politicians were also plying to these sentiments. If you are good the whole of India should support you why do you have to appeal to the people of your particular state? This was seen in the case of winners of other shows like Debojit and Qazi. But I was glad to see Qazi win because the boy had really worked on his singing amazing even the judges, and Ruprekha the other winner had also performed consistently well.
4This is a music show, so why so much importance to 'performance'?
5The attempt to stage emotional scenes, romances and cat fights between judges to compete with the soaps is disgusting.
All in all I think a good thing has started and though the cons seem more than the pros at this point of time they are nothing that cannot be rectified. maybe next time there will be a female Indian idol who sings the best and who wins because the whole of India voted for her. Meanwhile I am looking forward to see the new crop of performers of the next round of the show.

3 comments:

Squiggles Mom said...

I agree, Amit was much better. But I like the judges fighting... provides a lot of hilarity.

Koko said...

The good thing is that the news channels showed the winner while Mika was still performing on stage in Sony. Saved me an extra hour of sleep. I definitely thought Amit looked and sang like the idol even though he lost. Same as last year when Karunya was the better singer but lost due to lack of votes from down south where he belonged.As far as judges antics are concerned, it is so obvious that Anu malik tries his best to match up to the original simon from American idol in terms of rudeness and lack of tact. We all know its staged....but still i dont find it disgusting at all ...it adds spice to the show!

diya said...

smom thanks for leaving comment I had a lovely time visiting your blog! Squiggles is adorable and is exeptionally photogenic. My babies also look much bigger than they actually are in photos. I have the same verdict as you had from the doc for my younger one about slow weight gain but squig is too little for you to do anything maybe when she turns four months the doc will suggest appropiate liquid supplements meanwhile you keep eating and hope the fat goes to her through the feeds.
Coming back to the comment, you know its ok to see such jokers as Abhijit and Anu Mallik fight but I used to have some respect for Javed Akhtar which I have lost when I saw him exchanging brickbats with Ila Arun and now Anu Mallik and Alisha. Udit Narain has managed to escape without tarnishing his 'bhola-bhala' image in my mind. I don't know...if it is staged it should atleast display more taste and maintain the dignity of the judges.